AN OSCAR SPEECH YOU’LL NEVER, EVER HEAR: TRIGGER WARNING – TRUTH ZONE

The Academy Awards telecast is Sunday night, February 24th, and once again a tiny but powerful segment of our culture nervously fantasizes about a potential life changing moment when they can hold a little gold dude with a sword. Some in that auditorium might say that a patriarchal, sexist, paganesque statue wearing swim trunks and holding a weapon of mass destruction is triggering, but good luck getting a show of hands to support that sentiment. People do have priorities.

On Sunday night at the Oscars, very talented artists will preen in front of thousands on a red carpet. As the lights go down and the show begins, a nominated few will muse on being the focus of admiring millions and will pray – not quite sure to whom or what – that ultimately, they will be the One.

Snippets - Oscars - Years - Movies - Marvel/DC

Other than snippets, I haven’t watched the Oscars in years, but I’ve always enjoyed good movies. I just wish there were more of them. Since I’m not a Marvel/DC fan, I don’t pay much attention to today’s blockbusters. In trying to figure out my apathy toward the Avengers, Guardians, Superman, Batman and Wonder Woman, I think it may boil down to two things – nonhierarchical and confusing super powers and, “What does it take to kill somebody around here?”

Let me explain. There are twenty-five to thirty prominent superheroes, and I have no idea as to who can beat up whom. That seems too egalitarian for my tastes, like giving a trophy to the worst team in Little League. There needs to be an Alpha. And some of these super folks take a real beating from equally impressive bad guys, like getting slammed head first against a building at 200 mph. Or they are dismembered by metal octopuses or impaled by a telephone pole or...